Why Run With Your Dog?

Personal training for dogs. You’re kidding, right? Actually, no, we’re not. Research suggests up to 40% of our dogs are overweight, and they suffer from the same health complications that overweight people do. Veterinarians (including myself) are becoming more and more concerned about the increase in joint pain, heart disease and other obesity related illnesses in dogs.
Hence, Pooch to 5k. Dogs can’t lift weights, or use the gym. If you’re going to increase their fat burning, you need to increase the intensity of their exercise. This means that a daily stroll just won’t cut it any more, it’s too laid back. The Pooch to 5k program will help you get your dog from doing nothing much to comfortably running 5km, over a period of 12 weeks.
Because you’ll be running with your dog, you’ll also get a great workout three times a week, as you train yourself to run 5km. Why not subscribe to our dog health and fitness newsletter and grab your dog, and you’re ready to go!

Jan

05

Foot Pad Injuries

You can see the small injury to Sinner’s footpad on the photograph, I didn’t notice he had a problem until he started leaving little bloody footprints. It’s most likely that he stepped on a sharp rock or stick, or even a piece of glass.

What should you do if your dog has such an injury? In Sinner’s case, there was no foreign body sticking out so I chose to play the waiting game. I cleaned it thoroughly with dilute iodine, and I didn’t bandage it. I think a bandage would have lasted two seconds!

There were two things I was looking for. Firstly, I was looking for an increase in redness, pain and swelling that would suggest the wound had become infected. The other thing was for the wound to get better, then start to worsen again. This suggests that there actually is something still inside the wound.

In this case, Sinner was fine and his foot healed up perfectly. The last time he did this, he seemed to recover then two days later he couldn’t walk on the foot again. Off to the vet, who removed a tiny sliver of glass from his footpad. I said some rude things about young blokes who smash empty beer bottles on the footpath!

What you do under these circumstances is up to you. I was at an advantage because I’m a vet and know what may or may not happen. You may choose to do the same thing, or you may be more comfortable having your dog just checked out by your vet. Either is fine. Considering how much our dogs use their footpads, they don’t injure them very much at all.

2 Comments

I’m always surprised at how little the footpads get injured – I live on a college campus and so there is a lot of broken glass from beer bottles and the like. We try to avoid them but haven’t had issues – her bare feet are much tougher than my feet in shoes.

My pup Mia cut her paw a few month after we got her (she was 7 months) We are still unsure how she did it, but I noticed bloody footprints on my kitchen floor. So, I cleaned it up with some diluted peroxide, and kept a close eye on it. She managed to open it up again a day or so later, but after that, it healed up great!